In Another Life
by fictionalwritings09
Summary: Sequel to "Butterflies". "I will always have you. This 'you', Victor. Now...go be a 'you' that is with Emily, before I change my mind." Encouraged by his wife, Victor goes through rebirth to be with Emily, but when a scheming Barkis threatens it all, it is up to a memory-less Victor and his past-life family beyond the grave to ensure that history doesn't repeat itself. (T for now)


**FW09: Here's the promised story for that "Butterflies" Prelude! It was meant to introduce a few new ideas about what Emily's little butterfly transformation meant, and it gradually evolved into this fanfic.  
**

 **To all the people who read my other fanfic(s), please don't worry - I haven't abandoned them, I'm merely helping myself out of a writer's block by focusing on something else. (Also, the myriad of ideas and brainstorming in my Doc Manager helps.)**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Corpse Bride or any of the characters, that is all Tim Burton.**

* * *

 **In Another Life**

 **Chapter 1: Love Carried On**

How long had it been since Victoria Van Dort (née Everglot) had died?

...

Truthfully, she wasn't sure. She remembered the day she was wed with Victor Van Dort, and the trials of their pre-marriage around the year 1846 or so. And she remembered bitterly how she survived the Cholera epidemics that swept the nation in its deathly tides a few years after, while her first child, a freshly-born girl named Corrine, did not. Too little, too late, the Public Health Act of 1848 did little to protect her.

And yet, she and Victor never wavered from one another. **_Love carried on._**

For the next few years, she struggled over the idea of having more children while coping with the new laws and regulations that were aimed to cleanse the filth and disease from the streets. Unintentionally, the necessity of keeping clean hit the Van Dort fish merchant business hard, as new equipment and labor had to be bought and hired (Mayhew was sorely missed in this regard). But bless Victor and his sweet, caring soul, though, because he did it regardless of his parents' complaining over their empty coffers.

Not enough money for rodent furs and knock-off cigars? Get over it. After all, Victor wanted his second child to be born in a safe environment, their lifestyle be damned! Victoria remembered smiling when he won the argument.

And decided to support him, her own fears be damned. **_Love carried on._**

It took several months, as they bided their time and watched for the headlines of sickness to pass, praying for health above all else in the child. And lo and behold, she did bear a second - a perfectly-healthy boy this time.

Oh the adulation and wonder did they heap on him!

Their little Aubrey 'Gutknecht' Van Dort.

Victor thought up the middle name, and she didn't pry, although she was certain that he didn't have a "Gutknecht" on his side of the family. Certainly not on hers.

As she raised Aubrey, a pair of twins, a boy and a girl, arrived in their lives shortly after, named Abram and Abbie. Her mother and father were astounded (having more than one child in a noble house was rare), but the Van Dorts weren't impressed - Nell had a pair of uncles who were twins on her side, and William had a pair of great-grandmothers who were the same. Needless to say, Victor was overjoyed and loved them equally, though Victoria could see the pain in his eyes when he watched Abbie sleep. She remembered letting him rest his head in her lap one evening, comforting him despite the impropriety, over the memories of their firstborn daughter.

 ** _Love carried on._**

Time passed and she remembered marveling at how the world around her was changing, in so many ways. Photography, railroads, steam ships! The roaring of the circuses, and the drama of the theatre! Brass bands that echoed off the streets and into homes across the land, and 'speaking to the dead'! She liked laughing at that last one, modestly, of course. She and Victor had more than their fair share of mysticism, and it was funny to think that only now the public believed floodgates to the paranormal were opened. Her mother, on the other hand, passed away sneering and gasping in horror at 'how improper the young ones were nowadays'. Her father passed away shortly after, though it was through the imbibing of some old sherry. The Van Dorts held on much longer, and enjoyed taking their first, and last, picture together at the Great Exhibition of 1851, poised in all their _nouveau riche_ finery. They died happily in their imagined splendor in 1856, just before all their money had been lost in the Royal British Bank bankruptcy.

For a period of time, Victor worried and worked hard to rebuild their small fortune. However, it was the assurance that no matter how poor they were, they would still be a family that protected them from falling apart. **_Love carried on._**

She remembered watching her children grow strong amidst the change, and waved them off sadly, but proudly when Aubrey went to start his own business in retail, Abbie married the love of her life and moved to America, and Abram became a successful writer who followed in the footsteps of his favorite authors, Charles Dickens and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Abram was perhaps Victoria's favorite child, as she enjoyed reading his little manuscripts and often sneaked off to a corner of the library every once in a while to have him read to her. She never did learn to read in her youth ('not necessary for a young lady', she remembered her mother's words), and to hear such exciting stories of mystery and humanity greatly livened up her days.

As they aged in their home, still in that little village that smelled lightly of fish and earth, Victoria would enjoy long walks with her husband, then long naps in the library when their legs and backs aged, too. They would laugh, remember, and smile at one another. **_Love carried on_** , even when their bodies did not.

Then, darkness.

Victoria Van Dort had passed. Born 1826. Died 1885, the year in which British Empire had its first electric tram constructed.

She awoke in the Land of the Dead, and found herself among understanding and kind folk, albeit a little strange. Some remembered her, and delivered her compliments that were nearly 40 years old about how beautiful she'd looked in her wedding gown. They apologized in the same sentence, mumbling about having to deal with something distasteful and were unable to pass the messages before returning. Victoria completely understood.

Another year or two, and Victor followed her. He arrived with a grin on his old face and embraced some of the friends he'd made years ago, asking them how they'd been and if they'd seen his wife. Victoria remembered hugging him from behind, startling him, and causing him to comment that if he'd been alive, he'd have died then and there.

 ** _Love carried on._**

Years and years of love had indeed carried on, because even now they were beside each other, resting on a coffin-bench just outside of the 'New Arrivals Bar'. Victoria's head, a few wisps of white hair still clinging to a yellowed skull, leaned against Victor's shoulder, and his hand rested on her bare shoulder blade, bone against bone.

"How much time has passed?" she mused out loud, and Victor turned his head towards her, his eye sockets empty.

"Hmmm...not sure," he spoke in his usual soft tones, "Why?"

"A new arrival passed by not long ago, and I asked him how things were Upstairs," she pulled her head from him, causing dust to shift and float from her scalp, "He says that he died from the shock of women being ordained as priests! Can you believe it?"

"If they were anything like you, my dear," Victor replied, and his hand moved to stroke her cheek lovingly, "Then I'd believe it. Always so determined."

Victoria hummed at the gesture, but when he tried to pull her in for a lip-less kiss, she stopped him.

"Victor..." she started hesitantly, tucking one strand of white hair behind where her ear once was, "I think... _enough_ time has passed."

"...What do you mean, Victoria?"

"I mean...you should be at peace."

Several silent moments passed between them, and he moved backwards from her, his expression unreadable to the untrained eye, but Victoria knew that if he had flesh, his face would be aghast.

"Did I...Did I do something wrong?" he asked quietly, and a shadow of his former, stuttering self with no confidence showed its face.

"Of course not, Victor," she stated, closing the distance between them with a sweet, gleaming smile, "You've done nothing wrong."

"Then...why? You know that to be at peace means - "

"To be reborn," she finished, nodding her head, "Exactly."

Victor processed the words, his nervous ticks showing themselves with increasing panic.

"You wish...to be apart from me? Could this be...div...d-d-divor - "

"Victor," the wise woman interrupted him sternly, and he stopped talking, "...I love you. Since the moment I met you and even now, I love you. We've had children, survived heartbreak and ruin, and have spent both our lives and afterlives in each others' arms."

Just as he was about to question her words, Victor's wife held up a hand to stop him and continued.

"We've had our moments, Victor. Our love and our time together. I've had everything I could ever want from us," Victoria sighed, drawing dead air into her open cheeks, "Which is why...I release you."

"...Release me?"

"Mhmmm," she smiled, and took his hand, interlocking it with hers, "I will always have this version of you, Victor. The same man who stayed by my side when our firstborn died so young. The same man who walked with me even when his knees were in pain and lungs on fire. And the same man who chose me over _Emily_."

A hushed quiet fell over both of them as she uttered the name. Even the bar's noisy patrons seemed to grow silent, and Victoria noticed the tight grit of Victor's teeth at the mention of their formerly departed friend.

* * *

Yes.

She knew.

She had _always_ known.

Always known that a small part of Victor had connected with Emily all those years ago. Always known why Victor never agreed to naming one of their daughters 'Emily' in remembrance of her. Always known that, during the rare moments when they had heated arguments, he would take a heavy coat and wander into the middle of the woods, to the tree where Emily's murdered body had once been. And especially, always known the times when he would slip away from her to talk to Elder Gutknecht. Their conversations would be polite, and Victor would make up an excuse about something aching or breaking, but they would always meander into letting Victor spy on the Upstairs, on a soul most familiar.

For years, Victoria would sneak after her husband, and watch as Elder Gutknecht concocted a special brew in a cauldron. From there, they would take a piece of Emily's bouquet, the only thing remaining of her, and place it into the bubbling liquid. Seconds would pass before an image showed, and Victor would clutch the edge of the cauldron so tightly...

Occasionally, it was a woman. Other times, a man. And every few years, the style of clothing and age of the person changed. But no matter what showed, her husband would utter one word in a soft whisper, as if hoping to make the image respond.

" _Emily..._ "

Victor would allow himself a few minutes to watch the person inside the cauldron go about their day, unaware that they were being watched by a dead man. Or that Victoria was watching Victor. Sometimes Elder Gutknecht would watch with him, but most of the time, the mystic skeleton would go about his business as if it were the norm.

It wasn't the Elder's business to judge Victor, or anyone, when it came to the matters of the heart.

And when Victor had enough, he'd reach out and disturb the surface of the liquid, causing the image to fade in ripples and bubbles. He'd help the Elder dump the contents out, and then return to Victoria's side as if nothing had happened.

* * *

"Victoria..."

"I loved you too much, Victor," she continued, and felt tears well up in her eye sockets, "I knew the way you might've felt about Emily, but...I loved you too much."

"I love you, too, Victoria," the dead man tried to talk, but he felt her fingers on his teeth.

"I know," she laughed with a little hiccup, "But now, I've lived my life with you. Lived it and loved it. All the firsts and lasts, I've taken them all. There's nothing left that I want for myself...except to make you happy."

Victor remained silent, even when she pulled her fingers away. And she laughed again, but this time, the tears flowed. It didn't necessarily hurt, knowing that what she said was true about his feelings, but it certainly stung her pride a little. And maybe that's what convinced her - the love they had was more friendship than anything now. The touch of something familiar, the comfort that they felt around each other. But was it the same passionate love they had before?

"I used to think that it was Emily who came between us," Victoria held his hand in her own, staring down at their wedding rings nostalgically, "But as the years went by, I started to wonder if it was maybe... _me_? Who came between the two of _you_?"

"Of course not," he finally found his voice, but Victoria gave him a mighty look.

"How do you know?" she demanded strongly, and Victor reeled back in surprise, "How do you know that what we had was better than what you and Emily could have been?"

"W-Well, I-I...ahem, that is to say..." he coughed away from her, and gathered his wits, "We had children!"

"And they're dead!" she laughed in exasperation as she gestured to a building not too far away, "Even some of our grandchildren have found peace themselves and are being reborn this very minute! Oh Victor..."

The dead woman started to pull on her ring, and he began to panic again, trapping her hands together. A few pleas of reconsideration were uttered, but she only stared at him, mildly amused. Even after all these years, after learning to not be so fearful of people, Victoria still set him on edge at times. He really was too soft and sensitive for his own good.

"...Victor," she spoke above his sputtering noises, "I'll not ask if you loved her...but when Lord Barkis and I had married, and you had decided to throw away your life and move on...did you think you _could_ have loved her? Eventually?"

The wind died in his nonexistent throat, and Victoria snatched her hand away victoriously. She often won their arguments.

"I've asked Elder Gutknecht already," she pulled off the ring gently, and placed it in Victor's hand, "He has a ritual waiting for you, to tie your fate to Emily's."

The disbelieving man stared down at the ring, wondering dazedly if he was widowed, divorced, or single now. Victoria was always there for him, through thick and thin. Even when they'd lost Corrine and their money, she was there. And now she was asking _him_ to leave _her_ , so that he could pursue another woman? It made him wonder how many years they'd spent together, which was probably at least a few centuries now, considering the state of their bodies.

"Victor...I'm giving you permission," Victoria stated softly with a smile, "I will _always_ have you. _This_ 'you', Victor. Now...go be a 'you' that is with Emily, before I change my mind."

His wife (ex-wife) pulled him to his feet, then turned him around and pushed him. He fumbled a bit, and nearly ate cobble stone in the near-fall, but once he found his footing, Victor turned around to confront Victoria...only to find her gone. He looked down at the ring in his hand, then back at Elder Gutknecht's house. Thoughts and denials flew through his mind like insects, and he tried to swat them down desperately.

* * *

 _You love Victoria. And she loves you._

 **Yes...but she's released me from our bonds of marriage.  
**

 _Because she loves you.  
_

 **She wants me to be with Emily.  
**

 _She wants to make you happy. Victoria_ _makes you happy._

 **Victoria made me feel safe. Secure. Comforted. Loved.  
**

 _Yes, yes! Everything you ever wanted!  
_

 **At one point in my life, yes. And for many years after that. But...I never forgot Emily.**

 _..._

 **When I met her...I felt more. Wanted more! It was as if she'd brought color into my life!  
**

 _Emily would never have been able to give you the things Victoria had.  
_

 **Victoria never sang or danced in the moonlight.**

 _Why would she? She sewed, cooked, and cleaned. Isn't that enough?  
_

 **She also never liked animals, like my mother.  
**

 _Scraps was thrown away because he bit at your mother's ankles. And Abbie was allergic!  
_

 **We've had love and friendship, but there were never moments of passion or excitement in our lives.**

 _What of the Great Exhibition? The time your children were born?! Or the time you almost married - !  
_

 ** _..._**

 _..._

 **...Married Emily?**

 _..._

 **Let myself be married to a dead woman, who ironically had more life in her than the entire village?  
**

 _..._

 **To a woman so passionate, she had the gall to elope against her parents' wishes? To a woman who wasn't afraid to get mad at me? To a woman who, had she been alive, never would have turned my way otherwise?**

 _..._

 **I knew the moment I met Victoria, I wanted to spend my life with her. And I have. I've never regretted it. But, Victoria was right - there was always a part of me that wondered what my life would have been like had I met Emily when we were alive. Maybe even if I'd chosen to marry Emily instead of Victoria.  
**

 _...You know what to do then.  
_

* * *

...

It was one little step, then two, then three -

Then it turned into long strides.

Then a little jog.

Until it finally turned into a break-neck run, barrelling through alleys and streets on his bony feet.

All this time he'd been so conflicted over Emily. When he was alive, he knew he loved Victoria with all of his heart, but it always felt like something was missing from his life. When he looked into Corrine's eyes, a part of him wondered if she was perhaps Emily, but the thought of it made him so despondent and muddled that he refused to name the babe 'Emily'. When he trekked to Emily's spot under the tree, he felt guilty over why it calmed him to be there. Nor when he sneaked away from his wife during their latter years, to search for Emily when she returned to the Land of the Dead (which she strangely enough never did) or spy on Emily's reincarnated form. The guilt of the action ate him up inside.

What was clear to Victoria was so _unclear_ to Victor. That is, _u_ _ntil now._

Had this really been the answer? Just a chance to live the life he'd always wondered about, with Emily? The thought exhilarated him, excited him beyond words. He rushed into Elder Gutknecht's home with Victoria's ring clutched in his bony fingers, and called out to him.

"Elder Gutknecht!"

Victor's cry echoed loud among the dusty books and scared the crows from their slumber. The old skeleton himself was roused from his nap, and he scratched his skull in annoyance. However, when he saw who had called him, he gave a knowing smile and climbed down from his pedestal slowly.

"I've been expecting you, Victor...did Victoria explain?"

"Yes, yes she did. After all this time...I never thought it possible, but..."

"Just promise to take care of her," Elder Gutknecht raised a hand, "And let Victoria's sacrifice not be in vain."

Victor went silent once more, and he felt his heart ache. Yet, he couldn't get rid of the happiness he felt when he thought of being reunited with Emily.

"To make sure you have a second chance with Emily," the Elder began, waving to his crows to fetch him some items, "We have to do something...a little special."

"What do you mean, special?"

"When Emily gave herself to the Cycle, I had thought that she would've been reborn, died, and come back as a different person," he grunted as he dragged his bones to the shelves of books at his disposal, "But none of Emily's reincarnations have returned to the Land of the Dead for long. It's as if she keeps getting pulled back into the Cycle, with no chance of respite."

"For what reason?"

Elder Gutknecht went quiet, and tapped his shelf with a sigh.

"I'm not sure myself, but if I had to guess," he turned to look at Victor over his hunched shoulder, "I'd say she was looking for someone. Not consciously, of course, but..."

Again, Victor's old spirit seemed to soar. The implication of Emily waiting for him was too good to be true. The Elder looked on with a telling grin, and took a heavy book off the shelf with a grunt.

"Hmmm...now let's see...ah, here we are," he put the book on a low pedestal and set about gathering the ingredients, "Fate binding is always tricky, Victor. Trickier still, since we'll be binding you to a soul already set in the Cycle."

"Why's that?" Victor never understood the magical properties of their world, and after all the excitement that happened with Emily, he preferred to just spend his afterlife in peace with his wife.

"You want to be reborn alongside Emily," Gutknecht strained his voice as he tried to drag the cauldron into the center of the room, and sighed gratefully when Victor went to help, "But being reborn means being at peace. And you aren't at peace, not while you're separated from Emily."

Victor nodded, seeing the paradoxical nature of the problem.

"To remedy this, we'll be forcefully ridding you of your earthly ties first," the wizened mystic filled the cauldron with ectoplasm first, the 'lifeblood' of the dead, so to speak.

"Does that mean...forgetting Victoria?"

"And your life together, your children, and us," Elder Gutknecht added to the list as he added snake bones to the cauldron, "Even Emily herself."

The thought didn't quite sit well with Victor. Their life was hard, but by no means was it so unbearable that he'd discard his memories with Victoria so willingly. And his children...his precious daughter and two sons? What would they think? His drew in air through the nasal opening of his skull, not necessarily because he needed air, but to accentuate the difficulty of the situation that was presented. Even his friends here, Bonejangles and the bar crew, Elder Gutknecht...and Emily? There were some serious illogical holes in this magical ritual...which sounded a bit ridiculous when he thought about it.

"Then how am I to know it's her?"

The older skeleton paused in his brewing, which had turned from a ghostly green to a violent shade of neon-purple from the various potions and bones he'd mixed in.

"That's where the fate binding comes in," he addressed Victor's concerns for a moment before resuming his stirring, "If we can tie your destinies together, then you'll have an easier time finding her."

"And then what...we won't remember anything of each other."

"The outside may change," the Elder stopped stirring and examined his concoction with a trained eye socket, "But the inside never does. Whatever brought you two together all those years ago, it should bring you together once more."

"Reciting my vows at an unmarked grave of a murdered heiress?"

"..."

The joke was drier than Gutknecht's bones, and left a palpable, uncomfortable silence in the air. The elder gave a shake of his head.

"Just...trust in yourself, Victor. And trust in Emily," Gutknecht sighed, patting Victor's shoulder bone, "She always had a handle on things, even when they seemed at their worst. Now come...it is time."

* * *

 **Time? Time, indeed. But not what you think of it, you old crow.  
**

From a secret alcove stuffed with feathers, bones, and dust, former Lord Barkis Bittern watched from above as the unsuspecting pair of skeletons prepared for the ritual.

 _So that little bug, Victor Van Dort, is going to skip out on his wife for another? And absurdly enough, my own ex-betrothed? Intriguing...  
_

With a quiet grunt, Barkis dragged himself to the edge of the cavern, and peered over it. Dull purple light revealed pulsating flesh barely clinging to bone, and a pair of yellowed eyes, one ringed in blood. They narrowed, focusing on the actions of the two ants beneath him, and he sneered at the way they conversed in grins and promises.

Emily had brought this upon him. Her and that bed-wetting coward, Victor Van Dort.

Years ago, when he'd been dragged down into the Land of the Dead, he feared for what the dead would do to him. And at first, there were threats and the flash of steel, the clicks of gun hammers and the sizzle of something acidic. But, when he found that the dead could not feel pain, he was gleeful and boastful. After all, there was no punishment for a man who couldn't feel pain.

At least, that's what he'd believed. But there were worse things than just physical pain, especially for a man who was dragged body-and-soul into hell.

First, he'd experienced isolation. The spiders in the world below were nothing like the ones above, and worse, their thread was as strong as iron. They wrapped him up tight, then threw him into a casket, sealing it shut. He couldn't move or talk, and the way his mind turned and turned and turned soon had him realizing the severity of the ordeal. This is what mental patients felt like, he'd thought, locked forever in a padded cell and strapped down by their straitjackets. When they finally let him out, Barkis was dragged yet again into another punishment.

That time, it had been walking endlessly through the streets, never allowed to rest. Despite not being able to feel pain, he could still feel fatigue, and repetition of his actions grated on his nerves. When he tried to stop, however, maggots who resided in his brain started to whisper things - every horrible, twisted, fiendish action he'd committed, and how he should be ashamed of himself. Barkis thought he'd be able to tune them out, but then they started the _chewing_. That disgusting, awful noise inside his head that made him want to split his skull open and dig them out, but couldn't. They'd severed his hands and kept them from him, and at times, he could feel something _touching_ them...he figured it out when the bar's special drink for many nights read "Phatal Phalanges".

On and on went the punishments, until he was able to escape undetected. A massive influx of new arrivals distracted his usual torturers one night (he thought he heard the words 'iceberg' and 'ship') and Barkis took the initiative to slip away. Since then, he'd been hiding and biding his time in the one place they'd never thought he'd dare hole up - Elder Gutknecht's home. Scripture after scripture, book after book, Barkis scoured the elder's library for a way to get back to the world of the living, but as they'd said before - the only way to return Upstairs permanently was to be reborn.

The mutilated man touched what remained of his face tenderly, and felt the pickled skin bloat before sagging back into place. He couldn't even look in the mirror without wanting to retch.

Someone would pay dearly for this. All of this.

* * *

"So, what if...something goes wrong?" Victor's bottom jaw set itself tight, as if he were quirking his eyebrows and frowning.

From the time he was alive until this very moment of his after life, Victor was a man who doubted, questioned, and paused with nearly every decision or event. How Victoria and his children (affectionately named the "Triple A's") could tolerate getting through a dinner let alone their entire life with the man, the elder never knew. However, Gutknecht didn't fault him on it - this time. The spell was intricate, and with the ingredients needed to make the spell, they only had enough for one chance.

"It won't," the thin skeleton set his teeth in the tight line of a grimace, "It _can't_."

Before Victor can ask why, Elder Gutknecht pulled Emily's bouquet from behind his back. Baby's breath and roses, with just a smidge of violets leftover. The dead Victorian-era gentleman did learn that the violets were Emily's least favorite of the bunch during their brief time together, so he always used the violets for the spying spells (Victoria and Emily both loved his sentimentality - he winced in remembering Victoria). And before he could protest, the elder threw the entire floral display into the cauldron, wrapping and all. Victor ran to the edge of the cauldron in a panic.

"No! That's all we have left of her!"

"That's exactly why, Victor," empty eye sockets gazed at the younger dead man with seriousness, "The price for sorcery is never cheap, and for a spell like this, sacrifices must be made. So we must hope that this chance is not wasted...because it's the only one we have."

Victor leaned over the cauldron and gripped its edge tight, a distraught look on his skeletal features. The petals floated to the surface delicately, bubbling up from the bottom before disintegrating and turning the potion into an eerie light blue color. With a vague and burning feeling in his chest, the pastel swirls reminded him of Emily.

"The ritual is ready," Elder Gutknecht drew the man to his feet, and pushed him so that his face was directly over the center spiral of the concoction, "All that is left is you, Victor."

"Me?"

"Yes. Body and soul, Victor," he placed one hand on the man's spine, urging him into the cauldron.

Again, the skeletal Englishman found himself hesitating. He didn't want to forget Victoria or their children. He didn't want to forget about the Land of the Dead and all the friends he'd made. It made his empty chest feel even more hollow, and he looked at Gutknecht for any last words of advice. However, the elder only pointed at the cauldron, and as Victor followed the bony finger, he noticed a little image. A wavering distortion that flowed and ebbed, and he let a breathless gasp escape him.

It was Emily, but...not the same one he knew.

Instead of straggly blue-black hair, she sported flowing dark brown locks that were wavy and spiraled into tight ringlets down her face. Her skin was a rosy peach color, and the parts where he'd seen exposed bone and gaunt cheeks were covered in lovely flesh. Her wedding dress, once torn and exposed, was whole once more, and showed a beautiful hourglass figure cut in diamond and pearls. Waves of white silk enveloped her like water, trailing from her flower headdress, and he realized it was her veil.

"...God, she's beautiful," he murmured, and he watched as something seemed to float down into her clasped hands.

It was the bouquet, still dried and frosted over, but as soon as it slipped into the little opening in her hands, it sprung back to life. Baby's breath coiled and sprouted light blue buds along its spine, and her favorite roses bloomed into a vibrant red. Even the violets seemed to re-populate the bouquet, splashes of dark purple contrasting against the red and blue. And once done, he saw that her eyes, which had been closed, seemed to flutter open. His breath hitched, a little whistle of air whipping past his vertebrae, and he swore that she was looking at him. He took a small moment to observe the pretty, half-lidded orbs, which were once dull and sunken, and noted the color of her eyes - green with hints of blue.

"Go to her, Mr. Van Dort," Elder Gutknecht suggested finally, having watched the man's face change into awe, "She's waiting for you."

If Victor had a mouth, it would be dry, and he'd be trying to swallow the nonexistent lump in his nonexistent throat. It still felt too surreal. Yet...when Emily's hand moved from its clasped position on her chest, to reach out to something in front of her, he felt his soul jump and become drawn in, as if she were some siren calling to him. Slowly, but surely, a mesmerized Victor started to climb into the cauldron, lifting a bony knee to raise himself on the lip of it. Thoughts of Victoria, of Corrine, of Aubrey, Abbie, and Abram, of Elder Gutknecht and the others - they all started to lift from his mind and disappear with the wisps of supernatural smoke that rose from the ritual concoction.

However, just as he started to bow his head towards the smooth liquid surface, his hands bracing himself against the sides of the pot for the plunge, Emily's face contorted in the image. Her hand changed from reaching for something to pointing, and he became all too aware that her eyes had focused on something behind him.

He craned his skull upward, and the last thing he remembered seeing was a mass of veiny, yellow-eyed flesh dropping on top of him.

* * *

 **FW09: Whoo! Finished! This was one hell of an intro chapter, if I do say so myself! LOL Sorry if that sounded arrogant, I'm just kind of proud that I fit this much exposition in one chapter so that we don't have to necessarily deal with all of this later.**

 **Also, if you're wondering what happened to Victor in this last scene, just a few lines above this sentence, our dear ex-Lord Barkis decided to crash the party, literally. And into the ritual potion Elder Gutknecht used to tie Victor's fate to Emily. The consequences of this, however, will be explained next time! Now, onto me writing my next chapter for 'Bedtime Stories', XD.**

 **(Any questions or comments? Feel free to leave a review/PM!)**


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